


Paving the Road to Hell

by gaeriel



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene, One Shot, Other characters mentioned - Freeform, Tony Means Well, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, things just seem to go wrong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2018-07-12 03:52:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7084561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaeriel/pseuds/gaeriel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Siberia, Tony reflects on past events. Did I say "reflect"? I meant "wallow". Tony wallows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paving the Road to Hell

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place directly after most of the events of Captain America: Civil War and contains spoilers for the movies.

Tony deposited a large sum of money into Laura Barton’s account to help pay for the expenses of running a farm and raising – geez, how many kids was it? She called him and screamed in his ear, and he took it. Residual guilt for getting her husband tossed into a giant floating prison after he had already hung up his bow and retired. When Laura’s shouting devolved into sobs, he closed his eyes and resisted the urge to throw the phone at the wall. He never could handle tears very well, especially when the tears were genuine. He made comforting noises and promised to see what he can do about getting Clint released. 

After the call ended, then he threw the phone at the floor and stomped on it for good measure. It didn’t break, of course. He made good tech. It would have been more satisfying if the screen had at least cracked a little bit. 

He poured himself some scotch and set it on the counter and stared at it. Pepper had hated how much he drank and he had cut back for her. But Pepper was no longer a consideration, was she? He grabbed the tumbler and threw back the alcohol like it was a shot and poured himself another glass.

Just like the phone, drinking was not nearly as satisfying as it should have been. 

He sighed and slumped against the hard granite of his wet bar. The penthouse seemed so empty without Pepper’s heels clicking against the floor or JARVIS’s disembodied voice there to talk with. FRIDAY worked in a pinch, but she was no JARVIS, who had been with Tony for decades before being sucked into Vision. Vision was no JARVIS, either. 

Tony missed when the entire team was living out of Stark Tower, for those months between the fall of SHIELD and him opening the facility upstate. They were too loud, had taken up too much space, and he had lost track of how many times he nearly broke his foot on Thor’s hammer, but it had still been a good time, despite the constant physical drain from endless missions taking out Hydra bases. 

He looked over at the spot on the floor, now fixed and buffed to a shine, where Banner as the Hulk had put Loki into the ground repeatedly. JARVIS’s recordings of that were among his greatest treasures, and the team had bonded after the Battle of New York watching that on replay.

No more team. Everybody was scattered or locked up. Banner had run away to who knows where. Thor was back on Asgard and who knows if he would ever come back – would Heimdell have even told him what had happened to his Midgardian friends? Even Jane Foster had stopped emailing him to ask if he had heard from Thor months ago. He still renewed her research grant, because she was Thor’s and therefore by extension his, and he took care of his people.

Rhodey had lectured him many times about how there were other ways to show people he cared than throwing money at them. Maybe one day, Tony will figure out how to get his emotionally stunted heart on board with that concept. (“Emotionally stunted” – that was what Pepper had called him during one of their last arguments.) Until then, he had more than enough money to go around and it wasn’t like he could spend it all himself, anyway. So he had financed the Avengers. Built their new base. Outfitted them all with the best weapons, armor, and training he could give them. 

But he couldn’t take care of them, in the end. And it hurt, he admitted it to himself, sitting alone in his cavernous penthouse, that most of his team had sided with Cap and had not seen that he was just trying to keep them all safe.

And look how that ended up. Natasha was in hiding, Rhodey was paralyzed and forced to hang up War Machine, and everybody else was stuck in Ross’s nightmare undersea Guantanamo. And god only knew where Steve and Barnes had disappeared to after—just, after. Even if it was in his nature to apologize, if it was a behavior he could have learned from his parents, Cap and Barnes had taken away that choice by going to ground. He had always prided himself on his brains, on his genius intellect. But when it mattered, his heart took over his ability to reason and he had lashed out at one of the few people on the planet he considered a friend.

He wanted—needed—another drink, but sighed and moved purposefully away from the wet bar toward the sitting area. He tried to remember the last time he was this desperately lonely and failed. Even after his parents’ death, he had Obadiah, that backstabbing bastard.

“FRIDAY,” he said, and his heart ached again, mourning his old friend who had been his constant companion since long before his abduction and becoming Iron Man. “Any sign of Rogers or Barnes?”

“Negative, sir,” she replied, and anticipating his next question, added, “Nor of Banner or Romanov.”

He had known the answer. She had been tasked with letting him know the second there was even a hint any of them had surfaced, but he had asked for the excuse to have somebody to talk to. He sighed as he flopped down onto the couch and ran a hand through his hair. “Is Pepper still in California?” 

“Yes, sir. She is touring the new SI sponsored environmental think tank in Montecito today and is due to fly back after. Her plane should land in New York tonight.”

“Send her an email telling her she works too hard.”

“Will do, sir.” There was no hint of snark in FRIDAY’s voice, as there would have been in JARVIS’s. Another thing that he missed. He hoped that over time, she might evolve to have more of a personality. He missed the banter. He needed banter.

Happy was with Pepper. Tony had awhile ago insisted he can drive and bodyguard himself, and that the Stark Industries CEO probably needed more protection than the guy who was a bonafide superhero who hangs out with other superheroes. Rhodey was in DC being looked after by the best medical team Tony could find, though he’d be back in New York soon. T’Challa had gone back home to bury his father and run Wakanda, and though they had fought together out of circumstance, Tony had never bonded with the guy. Even he, with his severe lack of boundaries, knew instinctively it was probably not a good idea to call up the ruling monarch of an entire country to ask if he wanted to hang. 

He opened his mouth to ask FRIDAY about Vision, but closed it again. Vision was at the Avengers facility in upstate New York. He knew that without having to ask. He had so many mixed feelings about Vision. He sounded like JARVIS but was not him. In some ways, JARVIS had died when Vision was created. Tony knew it wasn’t Vision’s fault but he always felt a pang whenever the android opened his mouth to speak. 

“Everybody leaves me,” he said to himself.

“Sir?” FRIDAY’S voice asked. 

He shook his head and stood up. “Nothing. Don’t worry about it.” He glanced longingly at the bottles of alcohol on the wet bar and resolutely turned away. He could head down to his workshop and lose himself in tinkering with his suit; he had fixed it already after—his mind shied away from the rest of that though—just, after. But it could always be improved. Rhodey’s braces were already done and just waiting for the man to try them out. There was also—yes. That project he can do. 

He paused at the elevator with sudden inspiration. There was _one_ person he could cajole to keep him company. He pulled out his phone—still unscathed after being jumped on earlier. “Hey, FRIDAY. Call Peter Parker.”

The phone in his hand started dialing. After a few rings, Peter’s reedy voice answered. “Hello?” It was hesitant and a bit muffled.

“Peter! It’s Tony Stark. Want to come science with me?”

There was a thump and Peter’s voice came back stronger. “What? Tony?” There was some more rustling. “Tony, it’s 8 in the morning! Saturday morning!”

He glanced out the window and was a bit surprised to see sunlight. “Huh, so it is.” He cleared his throat. “Well, time to be up and about, bug-boy! There are toys to build, explosions to cause! You, me, my workshop. Chop chop.”

A hint of a whine entered Peter’s voice. “But it’s 8 in the morning! I didn’t get home until after 3 AM.”

“What the hell were you doing out until 3 AM?” 

“Chasing Doc Ock through the sewers. By the way, is that new costume you made me dry clean only or can I throw it in the wash? It is super gross after last night.”

“You can wash it. But I made you a better one already with some flexible armor. You can pick it up later. Since you’re coming by to tinker and possibly blow shit up with me.” Tony stabbed the elevator button with his finger and stepped in when the doors opened. “FRIDAY, workshop.” 

“Huh? Today’s Saturday.” 

“I was talking to my AI. Her name’s FRIDAY.” Tony walked into his workshop and surveyed the controlled chaos. “Anyway, come by. I’ll give your name to the guard downstairs. We’ll order something for lunch. Breakfast too, if you’re hungry. See you in an hour or so.” Ignoring Peter’s sputtered protestations, he ended the call. 

“FRIDAY, pull up the schematics for the Winter Soldier arm.” After, he had collected Barnes’s metal arm and found it to be a hodgepodge mess of patched together technology that ranged from pre-Soviet-era to modern. He had some idea of designing a better one that was more elegant, lighter, more responsive for Barnes, wherever he was. It could serve as an apology for ripping the old one off in his grief-fueled anger. 

He lost track of time and he jumped a bit when Peter’s voice echoed through the workshop. “Holy shit.”

Tony peeled off his goggles and set down his soldering gun. He peered at the boy approvingly. “Now _that_ is the correct level of reverence and awe.” He stepped away from the workbench and spread his arms. “Welcome to Tony Stark’s house of scientific wonder and engineering delight.” He stepped toward the boy and draped a casual arm around his shoulders. “Want a tour? What do you want to see?”

“Is that Captain America’s shield?” Peter pointed wide-eyed in the corner.

Tony looked at him with disbelief. “Seriously? That’s what you focus on? What kind of science geek are you?”

Peter rolled his eyes, but obligingly turned away from the iconic shield and allowed Tony to drag him from workbench to workbench. 

“Now, young padawan.” Tony rubbed his hands together and smirked. “Here’s my current project.” He pulled up the hologram of the new arm he was designing and with a flick of his wrist, sent the image shooting over to Peter. 

“Whoa,” Peter breathed softly. He expertly manipulated the schematics as if he had holograms in mid-air to play with every day. “This is _awesome_.” He looked up at Tony. “This is for that guy for the metal arm, right? The one we were fighting?”

Tony sheepishly nodded. “Yeah, I kind of ripped his old one off him and thought it was only polite to replace it.” At Peter’s look, he pointed a finger and said, “Hey hey hey. No judgy face from those who aren’t even old enough to shave yet.”

Tony had to admit that the kid, while prone to running his mouth (perhaps it was a nervous tic?), was wicked smart. He was not Tony Stark-level smart, but he knew his stuff. Tony threw himself into the work, letting his brain focus on mechanics and power sources instead of the misery he had been wallowing in before. The two were working on putting together the circuitry for a prototype arm, empty pizza boxes scattered around them, when a throat cleared.

Tony looked up. “Oh, Pepper. Hey.” He cleared his own throat and wiped his face with the back of his hand. “You’re back.” He slipped his hands into the back pockets of his jeans and rocked on his feet. “How was California?” he asked nonchalantly—or at least, he hoped it was nonchalantly. God, this was painful. How was he supposed to act after being dumped by the woman who had literally been the only serious romantic relationship in his life? (His sad, sorry excuse for a life.)

Pepper walked into the workshop and looked questioningly at Peter. “California was good.” She fiddled her fingers and shifted from foot to foot. He felt a little better know she was nervous too.

Peter was looking back and forth at the two of them with an increasingly alarmed expression on his face. “So, um, it’s getting late. I should get going.” He grabbed his backpack and edged toward the door. “It was great, Tony,” he said with a wave. “Give me a call if you want to do it again. Thanks for the new suit. Bye!” He then slipped around Pepper and nearly ran out of the room.

Tony sighed and braced his hands on the table. 

Pepper looked at him and crossed her arms. “Just why are you hanging out with a teenager?” She cocked her head and her eyes widened, and he could imagine a light bulb blinking on over her head. “Oh my god, he’s Spider-man, isn’t he?” She stepped to the other side of the workbench and leaned forward. “You called in a _kid_ to fight the _Avengers_?”

Tony winced at the sharpness in her tone. “In my defense, I was desperate and you weren’t there to stop me from making poor life choices.”

She reached out and poked him in the chest. “Oh, no. You don’t get to blame this on me. You did this all on your own. Tony!” She threw her hands up. “What if something had happened? He could have gotten seriously hurt! Or worse!”

“He has a healing factor,” he said, knowing just how lame a defense that was. “And he’s been running around New York taking out crooks all by himself for a while now. At least I gave him a better suit than the old spandex one he cobbled together from dumpster diving in the fabric district.”

She looked deeply unimpressed. “You are unbelievable,” she said flatly.

“What was I supposed to have done? Cap refused the compromise I made to keep his ass out of jail. Most of my team had abandoned me. I was trying to keep everything from falling apart and I did the best I could with a really shitty situation.” Tony ran his hands through his hair. He sighed, and slumped down again, suddenly feeling defeated. “Look, Pep. Let’s not fight, please. I’m so sick of fighting with the people I care about. I made some really crappy decisions and I have more guilt than I know what to do with.” He looked up at her, pleadingly. “I just wanted to fix things.”

He wished she would stop looking at him with such pity. It made him feel even worse. “Oh, Tony. You can’t fix the world.” 

He laughed once, a sharp and ugly sound. “Then what’s the point?” He waved a hand in the air, encompassing the workshop, the tower, and even beyond. “I have so damn much. Why can’t I fix things?”

Pepper reached out gently and grasped his hand. “You trying to fix things ends with you trying to control everything. People don’t like being controlled.”

He snorted. “Yeah. I got that when Cap started wailing on me with his shield.” He glanced over at said shield sitting in the corner of his workshop. “I fucked up, Pep. I fucked up big time, and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“You might not be able to fix it,” she told him softly. “There are situations you can’t spend your way out of.”

“You’ve been talking to Rhodey.”

“I stopped by DC on the way to California. We talked about you a bit.” Her hand tightened around his briefly before falling away. He missed it immediately. “You know he doesn’t blame you.”

He curled his hand back protectively against his body. “I know he doesn’t. I blame myself.”

“Tony,” Pepper said slowly, gently. “Maybe you should talk to somebody.”

“Last time I tried, Banner fell asleep on the couch.”

“I meant a therapist—a real one, not a nuclear physicist who moonlights as a medical doctor. You obviously have a lot you need to work through.”

He tried to joke, “I was doing so well avoiding my issues through booze and work like my old man.” The joke fell flat. 

“You’re not your father. Maybe you should stop comparing yourself to him.” she sighed. “Look, Tony, I’m exhausted. Just think about it, okay?”

He watched as she started moving away. “Why’d you come here anyway, Pep? You haven’t come by since—well, you haven’t come by for awhile. So why now?”

Pepper studied him. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she exhaled, she looked at him again. “Happy and I are dating,” she said simply. “I wanted to tell you personally.”

“Oh.” He felt like he had just been punched in the gut and something in his chest seized up. “Well, mazel tov.” He swallowed and tried for flippant. “I hope you two crazy kids are very happy together. Be sure to invite me to the wedding.”

She opened her mouth but closed it without saying anything. She shook her head slightly and smiled sadly. “Bye, Tony.” She turned and walked out of the workshop, and he watched her go silently.

He looked down at the workbench, at the scattered bits of wires and circuit boards and tools, at the stack of empty pizza boxes that he and Parker had gone through. Everything was a mess, just like his life. Suddenly, he desperately needed to get out of the workshop, out of the tower.

“Hey, FRIDAY?”

“Sir?” she responded.

“Clear my schedule of anything I need to be in the city for. I’m going to work out of the Avengers compound for the next few weeks.” 

“Yes, sir.”

“And schedule a call with Ross as soon as possible.” He needed to see what he can do to get his team (they were still his team, damn it) released. Hell, he’d even see what he can do for that new guy, the one with the weird suit who could grow or shrink, and wouldn’t he like to know just how that worked.

Pepper may be right and he can’t fix everything, but he was damn well going to try to fix what he could. He would always look out for his people, his strange little family he had collected around himself. He was Tony Stark, after all.


End file.
